In a continuing effort to improve the quality of shipping fruits, I, the inventor, typically hybridize a large number of peach, nectarine, plum, apricot, and cherry seedlings each year. I also grow a lesser number of open pollinated seeds of each of these fruits, usually to capture recessive traits. The present invention relates to a new and distinct variety of nectarine tree, which has been denominated varietally as ‘Pearlicious VI’.
The present variety was hybridized by me in 2003 as a first generation cross using an unnamed yellow flesh nectarine selection designated by code number ‘6P740’ (unpatented) as the selected seed parent and ‘Diamond Pearl’ (U.S. Plant Pat. No. 14,242) white flesh nectarine as the selected pollen parent. The fruit of this cross was gathered in the spring of 2003, and the seeds were removed from the fruit, germinated, stratified, and grown as seedlings on their own root in my greenhouse. Upon reaching dormancy the following winter, the seedlings were transplanted as a group to a cultivated area of my experimental orchard located near Le Grand, Calif., in Merced County (San Joaquin Valley). During the fruit evaluation season of 2007 I selected the present variety as a single tree from the group of seedlings described above. Subsequent to origination of the present variety of nectarine tree, I asexually reproduced it by budding and grafting in the experimental orchard described above, and such reproduction of plant and fruit characteristics were true to the original plant in all respects. The reproduction of the variety included the use of ‘Nemaguard’ (unpatented) rootstock upon which the present variety was compatible and true to type.
The present variety is similar to its seed parent, ‘6P740’ nectarine by producing nectarines that are mostly red in skin color, clingstone in type, and firm in texture, but is quite distinguished therefrom by producing nectarines that are white in flesh color instead of yellow and that ripen about twenty-five days later.
The present variety is similar to its pollen parent, ‘Diamond Pearl’ nectarine (U.S. Plant Pat. No. 14,242) by producing fruit that is clingstone in type, white in flesh color, and firm in texture, but is quite distinguished therefrom by producing fruit that is larger in size and that matures about seventeen days later.
The present variety is most similar to ‘Kay Pearl’ (U.S. Plant Pat. No. 10,871) nectarine by producing nectarines that are white in flesh color, mostly red in skin color, and that typically mature in late June to early July, but is distinguished therefrom by having reniform instead of globose leaf glands and by producing fruit that is clinstone instead of freestone in type, that is much larger in size, and that is lightly acidic instead of sub-acidic in flavor.